Which comic do you like more?

[Paolo Castagno]

Hello,

Yesterday I announced the new version of the Italian Inducks portal, 
with a new pool (about Scarpa's most popular characters).

In the previous version of the page there was another pool, asking to 
the visitors which was the best Disney publication in Italy at the 
moment, there were a lot of answers, and there are the results and a 
(not very) short comment by me:

Topolino (134)......................31%
Zio Paperone (62)...................14%
I maestri Disney (61)...............14%
Paperino (45).......................10%
Paperinik new adventures (42).......10%
Minni (27)...........................6% 
I Grandi Classici (17)...............4%
Mickey Mouse Mistery Magazine (16)...3%
I Classici (10)......................2%
Nuovo Almanacco Topolino (4).........0%

Total: 418 votes.

Well, Topolino's first place was easy to predict, also if I didn't 
expect such a clear victory: in the latest years Topolino seems a little 
bit more interesting after many dark years of absolutely nothing... I'll 
keep crossing my fingers!

What is more meaningful, and what should induce Disney Italia editors to 
reconsider their own editorial policies, is the third place (almost 
"second" ex-aequo) of "I Maestri Disney" a publication which was 
cancelled few months ago, and then reissued with 2 special numbers 
devoted to Scarpa (the first one) and Cavazzano (the latest one). 

Those issues, also if pretty expansive if you consider the average price 
of Disney comics (15.000 Lit vs. 3.300 Lit of Topolino), had a lot of 
success, and, IMHO, it means that there *IS* a marked ready to buy, but 
this market needs *GOOD* products, just like I Maestri are (were?).

The real "surprise" of this pool comes from "Minni" an issue enterely 
devoted to young (very young?) female readers. I don't know if there are 
any girls on this mailing list from Italy, but, well, it is a surprise 
to me: I was thinking Minni was a publication with a very low market 
share, and without a real customer loyalty... but it seems I was 
wrong...

On the other hand, the *worst* performance comes from "I Classici", an 
historical publication, which made the Disney comic history in Italy: 
how sad to see them dying at the bottom of the list!!! 

It used to be a wonderful publication, copied in many other European 
countries, since it was reprinting great stories, from previous Topolino 
issues, linked together by a main theme... but nowadays it isn's so 
anymore: stories are choosen randomly(IMO), there aren't anymore the 
Giuseppe Perego pages linking the stories together, covers are too 
"technological" (ah... the G.B. Carpi covers from early 70ties....) and 
there aren't anymore titles on each issue distinguishing one from all 
the other ones: I still remember "Pronto Topolino", "Tutti Paperi", "Il 
fantastiliardo" and many others great issues... now what should I 
remember? Issue 285? issue 276?.... I don't like it!!! I don' like it at 
all!!

OK, I suppose you had enough of it... but still, I'd like to have some 
feedback from you all, to check if I'm the same old rambling grumphy, or 
if *we* all are the sam old rampling grumphies!!! ;-)

Ciao,

  - Paolo

p.s.: the result scored by Almanacco (0%) is **much too high** for its 
low low low quality!!! (and remember that the original run of Almanacco 
printed some *great* stories...) :-(

-- 
http://members.xoom.it/inducks  mailto:p.castagno at libero.it

'Addio, Reginella! Ti restituisco il medaglione! Anche se la nostra 
primavera non e' diventata estate, ti ricordero' e rispettero' il tuo 
segreto per sempre!'
(Paperino in I TL  873-C)